Martine's discoveries in the world of yoga

How to set my intention for a class?

When you go to a yoga class teachers often start with: “Now please set your intention for today’s practice. Setting this intention has been a long struggle of mine: what does it mean? What is my intention for today? I usually just drew a blank: no clue at all. So I started setting intentions like: “Today I will hold this pose for 5 breaths, because last time I did 4”. Or “I want to give a full 100% in class, if necessary even more”.

Only until recently, after having a conversation about this with one of my teachers, I learned that what I was doing was setting a goal, not an intention. So how does it work?

How to set your intention?Setting your intention is an individual exercise that helps you deepen your practice and yoga experience. It is something you need to practice at that very moment on your mat. It can be connected to your emotions, so if you feel anger practice forgiveness, if you feel sadness practice joy, if you feel fear practice comfort, and so on.

It helps to ask yourself the following questions:

Why am I practicing yoga?

What do I hope to create or gain?

What do I need to get rid off / what habit is not helping me anymore?

Setting intentions versus goalsRefrain from setting a goal, which is connected and directed to a future outcome; for example “my goal is to hold a pose for 5 breaths”. An intention focuses on what is most important and valuable to you at that very moment. Something that is important to you in the now. It is formulated with positive words, an example: My state right now is of instability. So my intention is to practice balance. Or I notice that I have been judging myself over a work related issue. So my intention is to accept where I am right now without judgment.

How to practice on the mat?Taking what you need at that very moment to your mat, means that you have to translate your situation to your practice. When you are practicing to accept where you are without judgment, you practice to refrain from telling yourself that others in class are better then you, or that you could have held the pose longer and therefore your practice has not been optimal, or that your mind is racing with thoughts and you can’t still it, so you are not a good student. When thoughts like these come to your mind, you stop them by telling them your intention as a mantra: I accept where I am right now and I am not judging. Put your thought aside and go back into your body, feel what the pose does to you. Focus on feeling the tips of your toes, the top of the head and all the other little and large parts of your own body.

Help of the teacherVery often teachers work with a theme. They have set up the routine around this theme. This can help you to set your intention if you don’t know what you need at that exact moment. Take the theme and make it as personal as possible. One day you will know what you need, so use this guidance until you can set the intention by yourself.

The benefits of setting an intentionSetting an intention is extremely helpful to focus. You can focus on your body and what is going on in your mind, instead of how cool your neighbors yoga pants are, that you forgot to buy something with your groceries and that you have 3 meetings at work tomorrow and you don’t feel prepared.

It also helps you to work with your daily struggles and find ways to make it easier to deal with them. As soon as these situations are starting to pop-up again in real life, you will slowly see the progress you are making.

End of the classSo besides just practicing your poses, deepen your practice as a whole and set your intentions for the needs you have. Revise your intention at the end of the class by taking some time to go over it. Learn from how you’ve dealt with your intention on your mat to take these lessons into your daily life.

And the cool thing is, setting intentions doesn’t only apply to yoga, it applies to all you do in life. So going forward, I am going to try to set an intention instead of a goal. And apply this to day-to-day tasks, my own practice and my yoga teachings.

2 thoughts on “How to set my intention for a class?”

Oh… Actually, I always set a personal intention linked to a real life outside of yoga – e.g. “to regain clear insight on this relation” or “for my closest friends who show me love”. Something very relevant in that particular moment.